Topic: Chinese 5 spice

[Korma Chameleon]

Over a decade ago when I lived in Darlington, my favourite restaurant, Star of Bengal, had a great base sauce. They had won some awards. It was early days for me, I still didn't know about base sauce, but in a tour of their kitchen I did see carrots (what??), cabbage (what??) and a big pan of golden sauce on the hob. What I was absolutely sure of was that they had Chinese 5 spice somewhere in the ingredients. I'm now fairly convinced this was part of their base sauce spice mix. I did try and replicate it at the time with my "from scratch" curry cook approach, but I think a retry with the base sauce method is called for.

Has anyone tried chinese 5 spice in a base and had good results? I'm a little unsure about proportions.

[greencoburn]

Sounds like a good idea!
Would love to know the proportions of a five spice.

The star anise is for me a very nice and strong spice - it might be overpowering for some curries, but I usually can't resist sticking it in...